“I need to talk with you.”
Ozawa sounded a little upset over the phone.
As requested, I went to a café in Jinbocho to find him waiting for me. When I sat down, he thrust a piece of paper at me.
“Read this.”
I did as he asked.
It was an undercover report about a cult in .
Before I could finish reading, he asked:
“You wrote this, didn’t you?”
His words caught me off guard.
It was a reasonable question. I’m a woman, after all.
When I first started out as a freelance writer, I had to take anything I could get, so I wrote some pretty extreme articles.
I remember being hospitalized around that time.
But I don’t remember writing the article in question.
I denied it, but Ozawa wordlessly indicated the last part of the article.
The author’s credits listed my pen name.
“You have a unique pen name. If you didn’t write this, then who did?”
I fervently denied ever writing that article.
I could see the doubt in his eyes as he continued.
“So, what? You were in some sort of fugue state at the time?”
Just as he finished the sentence, he seemed to realize something.
“It couldn’t be…”
I urged him to continue.
“The women in New UMA Discovered! The White Man! and Waiting didn’t die. Every woman who lived either lost their memory or succumbed to something like Alzheimer’s… What if that happened to you?”
Uncertain myself, I couldn’t respond.
“But if that’s true, then why were you saved? Why are you still alive after infiltrating their group?”
My barely functioning brain raced. Why am I still alive? Why wasn’t I chosen as a bride? Why couldn’t I go to a higher place…?
Then it struck me.
The undercover report was from 2000.
I could never forget. I lost my son just one year earlier.
He died in a traffic accident.
Following that, my husband and I decided to separate, and I quit my job at a publishing company to start freelancing.
I had always assumed that the intense physical and psychological stress of working too hard had landed me in the hospital. But according to the article, it was because of what happened at the facility.
If I really was the author, then it made sense that I would forget my assignment and console that other woman in the group.
Based on that idea, I offered Ozawa a theory.
The mountain caller targets women who have never given birth.
We had assumed it targeted young women indiscriminately, but it seemed this mysterious entity selected its targets very carefully.
Ozawa remained silent for a moment before replying.
“You could be right. No, that’s probably it. I’m sorry for doubting you.”
I told him not to worry and that he didn’t need to apologize, then we ordered our drinks.
Black coffee for me and an iced caffe latte for him.
He fidgeted constantly while we waited for our drinks to arrive.
Once they came, he drained his before talking.
“I’m scared,” he began. Then he told me the following:
✦ ✦ ✦
I realized something while reading that article.
The worshippers’ chant matched the one from the club my friend told me about in college almost perfectly.
There were some minor differences, though.
But how and why do I know that?
I just heard about it from a friend, so how do I perfectly remember the words they were chanting?
And how did my friend remember a barrage of random words muttered simultaneously by multiple people after only hearing it once?
Some friends contacted me the other day. Female friends.
They asked me to stop calling them in the middle of the night and talking nonsense.
They claimed I called them and said the following:
“Let’s go to the mountain. It’ll be fun. Let’s go.”
I don’t remember making those calls.
But when I checked my call history, I had contacted a bunch of women in my address book in alphabetical order.
Thinking about it now that I’ve heard your theory, I didn’t call anyone with children.
Have I lost my mind?
I think about this special edition all the time, no matter what I’m doing.
At first, I thought I was just really excited about my first assignment. But I realized something in the shower the other day when I looked in the mirror. My reflection was smiling.
I’m enjoying this.
And that scares me.
What about you?
✦ ✦ ✦
He continued, not waiting for my reply.
He expounded his opinion on the mountain caller, the red woman, and Akira.
When I eventually interrupted him, he finally stopped talking, took a deep breath, and said:
“I’m close. I can feel it. There’s still a lot of unknowns, but I feel like I can just about connect everything together. This special edition is going to be spectacular.”
He continued, the excitement never fading from his voice.
“I’ve come this far. I think it’s time to visit for myself.”
I had no right to try to stop him.
Because I was no longer safe, either.
So he left.
Two months later, he was dead.
No, it would be more accurate to say that’s when they found his body.
The editorial department called me to say they couldn’t reach Ozawa.
Knowing he was no longer alive, I told them he might have jumped off the dam.
I heard they found his drowned corpse, along with that of a woman he didn’t know.
Both of them were smiling.
Dear readers, I’m so sorry for deceiving you.
This is where About a Place in the Kinki Region ends.